Yup. Just shut up about it. However, most of the time it’s the religious types that cant keep quiet. I’m from a large Irish Catholic family. I get funny looks and some unwelcome comments when friends and family ask when My kids will be baptized (usually asked soon after birth). I have 3 sons. When I say they won’t be baptized the grief starts.
I usually calmly say that I’ve never said a word about your kids being baptized. I’ve even attended the ceremony. I can respect beliefs in a polite way. The problem is my beliefs usually arent accepted in a polite way. Unfortunately, my in laws are the biggest offenders. I always remain calm and polite. Even let my MIL drag my kids to church when she comes and visits. They get over it fast (the kids that is).
I even tolerate my wife making the impression that the lack of faith and attendence in church is my fault. I can understand her not wanting to dissapoint her parents. But in ten years of marriage she’s never mentioned going to church on Sunday. She’s just as content as I to read the paper and drink coffee and then go hiking with the kids.
To each his own. And yeah, yeah I get it. Most of the people on this site think Me, my wife, and kids are on the hell express. It’s the ones who seemed pleased by this that scare me the most.
I’ll end my rant with some Heinlein:
“The most ridiculous concept ever perpetrated by H.Sapiens is that the Lord God of Creation, Shaper and Ruler of the Universes, wants the sacharrine adoration of his creations, that he can be persuaded by their prayers, and becomes petulant if he does not recieve this flattery. Yet this ridiculous notion, without one real shred of evidence to bolster it, has gone on to found one of the oldest, largest and least productive industries in history.”
I find your comments very real and personal.
I am a Christian, not because I was told what to believe, but as the result of years of exploration and ultimately the process of elimination.
Thankfully, I was allowed to figure things out for myself, despite the superficial bible bangers and my own family’s history that was always present.
What I know to be true.
Nobody can TELL someone WHAT to believe.
Belief in virtually everything is conditionally and subject to revision upon the introduction and acceptance of new information.
Some people are more curious and thoughtful than others.
To each his own. And yeah, yeah I get it. Most of the people on this site think Me, my wife, and kids are on the hell express. It’s the ones who seemed pleased by this that scare me the most.
Thank you for your comment, strider44. That portion got a chuckle out of me: as often as the word "atheist" shows up in theads at conservative sites, all [fill in the blank] often breaks loose. I usually sidle away, close the door very quietly after myself, and don't return.
Ironically, I didn't mature as an atheist until I'd spent quite some while with my old pal Jim and taught myself to tolerate his religious notions. He never tired of reminding me, "There is a god, and you're not him," which incensed me the first few times he said it. As I started to commence to begin to force myself to become tolerant—only outwardly at first, of course—it gradually occurred to me my atheism was neither more nor less a faith than his Christianity. He died in 1995. I've often wished he could see he helped goad and nudge and push and tug me toward a bit more wisdom and essentially unchanged belief.
According to Frisky the wonder tigress, the Great Cat is going to punish all us heathen two-leggers for being mean mean mean to kitties by practically never giving them enough canned treats and practically never brushing them long enough and hogging the big soft middle part of the bed at night and not licking ourselves clean like sensible creatures.